


Dolens

by OtakuElf



Series: Fear, Faith, and Friendship [7]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Gen, Grey Wardens, Kirkwall (Dragon Age), Slavery, The Calling, The Inquisition - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-09
Updated: 2017-05-06
Packaged: 2018-04-13 18:04:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,424
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4531782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OtakuElf/pseuds/OtakuElf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A stranger stays in a small crossroads town.  What would cause such an odd elf to designate himself their protector?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Elven fighter

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Lunamoth116 for betaing!

The _elvhen_ man, obviously a fighter from his lean, muscular build and air of certainty, sat by himself at a table in the back. He always sat alone. Slender tattooed hands cradled the bottle of red Tevinter wine from which the man had been drinking. He had acquired a reputation for his extreme tolerance to wine, and the fact that he drank straight from the bottle. The workers at the inn were happy when he brought his glowering presence to the common room. They weren’t happy he was glowering, exactly. He had a menacing, dark look. Well, they were happy that the man had come to their tiny village, because he was quite useful in removing the increasingly troublesome demons and odd creatures that were traveling through the woods around them. They might have been pleased for him to take his grief and pain to his own small room up under the eaves. His grief and pain brought home their own. However, when he was doing his imbibing in the public area, he was not throwing the empty bottles at the single full wall of his slope-roofed room.

Every one of them was shaken, grieving over the deaths at the Conclave. Even those who had no link to any of the many men, women, humans, dwarves, and elves, mages and Chantry and templars who had died there mourned the loss of the Divine Justinia. At least the natives of Ferelden did. Obviously this man had lost someone of great importance. That cold small fact gave the men, women, boys and girls cleaning and cooking and serving at the inn a reason to give him some measure of privacy in his grief, and leeway in his bottle throwing. So long as he did no damage to any people, and no really permanent damage to the room, which was lined in pine boarding, not plaster. After all, this was Ferelden. A little roughness on the furniture and walls was to be expected.

The ferocity of the fighter, they’d all seen him slicing demons into shreds with his great _glowing_ sword, provided him with protection from the usual loud, drunken boisterous behavior that was normal for the common room of an evening. He was left alone in a small, unseen, but obvious circle around the table. He drank his wine. And until he called for another bottle he was not approached. If anything, his presence had cut down on the number of fights in the bar.

The evening was well under way when the iron-bound wooden door opened, letting cold air in and attracting attention from most of the regulars. Strangers stayed here, of course. Sometimes they were interesting, this inn being set to the side of the King’s Highway. A tall man, cloaked, and carrying a staff across his back, entered quietly and looked about the room, head tilted to hear the sound of conversation, the crackling of the fire that the innkeeper had laid in the fireplace to supplement the cast-iron stove in the corner. The innkeeper felt the fire was cheering, in spite of fire demons in the square the previous evening. The boys and girls who chopped the wood and kindling might groan at the need for more fuel, but they were glad of the brightness too. 

The man’s hood came down with a tug and a careworn face appeared, under straight hair, blond and grey, that was pulled back into a tail. A gold hoop shone from one ear. Nodding to the bartender, the man motioned to the cask behind the bar, placing coins enough on the scrubbed wooden counter. That the man was a mage caused no stir. He didn’t look to be raving, nor Orlesian, nor covered in blood and demons. Live and let live was the way of the crossroads.

Gathering his mug, the mage moved toward the lone elf, only to be stopped by the barmaid. “You don’t want to disturb, him, sir. He’s grievin’ sore, and not much for company right now.”

She got a nod and a small smile for her pains. Then the tall blond mage moved to pull a chair by the _elvhen_ fighter and sat down. “Fenris -” his light tenor was quiet and controlled “- I came as soon as I heard.”

The white-haired head lifted, and green eyes stared at the mage. “Anders. Is it safe for you to be here?” The deep voice had changed little in the ten years since they’d last seen each other.

“As safe as anywhere in this time. You’ve been tracking down demons for the locals. You know their numbers have increased.” Conversational, their voices did not carry. The barmaid watching them for the moment decided that their protector was not being bothered, and their new guest was in no danger. She went back to her own business.

“What do you know?” the _elvhen_ asked. He sat up from his slouch at the table and looked at the man across from him. “How did you find me? Where is Hawke?”

“What anybody knows. The Conclave met. The world exploded. Anyone who was attending the Conclave is dead. Grand Cleric Elthina sent word that she would be there to support the Divine Justinia. Where Elthina goes, Sebastian does too. Hawke was not there, but I think he said Varric attended for Maker knows what reason, and is still alive. Have you heard news of any survivors?” Anders’s request for information was not urgent. It had taken him a week to get this close to Haven. There was no need for urgent action.

“Some news, yes. None of Varric. You remember Knight-Commander Cullen? He is there, I have heard, and survived. Some templars on the road three days past were en route to join him in trying to put the world back to rights.” Fenris’s tone of voice showed exactly how well he thought that would go.

“Knight-Commander? Did he make that after Meredith’s death? Well, not death. Transformation into red lyrium. Still horrifying.” Anders shuddered at the memory, then took a long pull from the mug. “This is excellent ale,” he commented, slightly surprised.

Fenris nodded his white-haired head absently. “The innkeeper’s wife brews it. The locals are divided on that subject, as it’s apparently not a woman’s job - flows and humors and so forth that could interfere with the brewing. Not enough divided to stop drinking it,” he finished with a flash of humor.

The mage’s snort at the superstition was expected. Fenris enjoyed the small glow of pleasure at making a friend laugh. It had been some time since he’d last been able to do so. Anders took another pull before going on, “As for finding you? Tales of a glowing elf battling demons to save a small town? It could be none else, I thought. Even Theron Mahariel, the Hero of Ferelden, does not glow.

“Though I did expect you to be with Isabela on a ship somewhere, pirating away,” Anders said, looking keenly at the elf before him.

“Too much fish. Do you know what sailors eat, Anders? Fish. Fresh fish, dried fish, smoked fish, salted fish, along with nug jerky when they can get it. Every so often I need to get off of the ‘Siren’s Call II’ and find some other form of sustenance for a while.” Fenris looked about him, then dropped his voice even further: “Isabela is off on the Waking Sea hiding in plain sight with the children she talked me into ‘rescuing from slavery’. I feel surrounded by myself in miniature. Questioning everything. Isabela thrives on it. She is teaching them to pick locks, to disappear into shadows, and all manner of unsavoury behavior. Just as well she has them looking out for her. The Qunari have sent Ben-Hassrath after her time and again. They’re not likely to give up on that. She must pick her times ashore carefully.”

The look Fenris gave Anders was equally keen. “Bethany?” he asked.

“Hawke sent her away to the Free Marches. She took the babies. Well, they’re not babies anymore, are they? Traveling to the Free Marches is probably for the best. I have -” the mage paused before continuing “- not been myself lately.”

That got a more piercing look, and the question: “What does that mean?” 

Anders gave a deep sigh. “Do you remember what I told you about the Grey Wardens?”

“You told me many things,” Fenris pointed out, “half of which are difficult to believe. This is not a ‘Justice has come back’ issue?”

“No, for all I know Justice is still looking after Kirkwall. I have not seen him in the Fade for many years. Nor has Bethany. And I don’t think Justice has anything to do with the destruction at the Convocation.” Anders stopped, obviously thinking hard.

Fenris was startled. He had not thought of Justice. Could the spirit have caused such destruction to gain his own ends? Yes. There was no doubt about that. There had been the threat of such in Kirkwall. Sebastian had brought together all the elements necessary to separate Anders and Justice after the discovery of Justice’s plan. Would the spirit have done so in Haven? Fenris was not knowledgeable about travel in the Fade. He thought it unlikely that Justice would have traveled to Ferelden to destroy mages. Templars and the Divine? Possibly. Grand Cleric Elthina? Yes. The mages? No. Not when they were finally standing up for themselves as Justice had urged for so many years through Anders’s manifesto. 

“Fenris,” Anders called gently. Then he went on, “Fenris, this is not about Justice. I don’t feel that he had anything to do with the destruction in Haven.”

The fighter lifted his bottle of an inferior Tevinter vintage and took a long, practiced swig. “So you say. I grant you that the rumours of a green blot in the sky do not sound like the blue of Justice manifesting, nor the red of Vengeance. What, then, would cause Bethany to leave you to your own ends?”

“You make it sound permanent.” Another sigh. Anders took a drink, fidgeting with the wooden mug. “Well, it will be permanent. But not the way you mean. Bethany has not left me because I’m an ill-tempered brute who beats her, or has cheated on her, or any number of reasons. We’re still married, Fenris, still in love.

“But the Calling has started. Neither Hawke nor I could allow her and the children to watch me waste away from the Blight. It’s time for me to seek out the Deep Roads. To die there fighting the darkspawn. It comes to every Grey Warden. I expected another ten years before hearing it. But there you go.”

Reading the confusion on his compatriot’s face, Anders explained, “Every Grey Warden is tainted with the Blight. It’s our strength in fighting them. We can hear the Archdemon, know when darkspawn are around us, recognize other Grey Wardens by the Blight in our blood. After about thirty years we begin to hear the song of the Blight. It draws us back down under the earth to die, or to become a blighted twisted thing. You remember Hawke’s description of Larius? The Grey Warden-Commander we met in that mess north of Kirkwall?”

“You met an ancient magister, you said. Corypheus. Was this Larius there then?” Fenris searched his memory for the information.

Anders nodded. “He was - Larius was - frightening. Especially when I realized that it was my future. To be so stained with the darkness of the Blight that the darkspawn would not see me. To need nothing to sustain me but the blight, as it took me further and further away from being myself. No longer human. Until I died of the Blight sickness. Or worse, became a darkspawn myself. I could not put Beth through that. Hawke put her on a ship with Merrill, who was going back to her own people.”

Looking at the man, Fenris could see age had taken him. The grey in his hair outstripped the blond, although the lines that Fenris could see were no longer signs of pain. Instead, laugh lines edged the corners of Anders’s eyes. Fenris had seen the Blighted. Anders did not look like that, no dark patches to his skin. Fenris did not feel the weight in his stomach that the fatal illness of a friend should bring. “You don’t look blighted,” Fenris said, keeping his voice down. It wouldn’t do to have Anders murdered by the townsfolk due to a hint he might be afflicted with the Blight.

Anders waved a hand, still slender and long, in the air, “I am, and yet I’m not. It was on hold because of the ritual. There’s lyrium in it, I know, and darkspawn blood. In any case, I hear a song. It’s one I have heard before, when Hawke and I were in the Deep Roads facing Corypheus. As I said, I didn’t expect to hear it again for another decade. Usually it’s the Wardens who are inducted during a blight that go early. I was conscripted after the last blight had ended.

“I’m not alone. Theron’s been hearing it too. Almost every Grey Warden has. Though King Alistair, who has been a warden longer than either of us, has not. Theron went back to his clan to spend what time he has left with his wife and family. Nathaniel Howe, you met him in Kirkwall when we went back into the Deep Roads, is in the capitol to see if Queen Anora’s scholars can figure out what is happening. They have little enough to go on. Our vows as wardens forbid us being open and honest about our secrets.” Anders sounded bitter.

They both took some time to drink. The mage gave a shake, some of his hair straggling from the worn woolen binding. “This is not what I came to speak of though. You have heard no news of Sebastian?”

“None,” Fenris’s head was bowed as he spoke, “I’d have gone to Haven. Looked for remains, or survivors if there’d been any hope of that. The demons here were bad before. They’ve gotten worse since the Conclave blew up.”

“I can not figure how either side was able to blow up all of Haven. Or leave the mark they say remains in the sky.” Anders stared moodily down into his mug. “Even gaatlok, or the Dwarven black powder should not have been able to do this.”

Fenris swallowed the last drinkable bit in the bottle, leaving only dregs. “How interested are you in finding out?” he asked, looking at the tinted glass.

“Want to go with me?” Anders grinned. As quickly as that it was settlled. They would leave in the morning.


	2. The Dalish pirate

Merrill pulled her body up over the small, slatted wall around the wooden platform that the Rivaini and Fereldan sailors called “the Crows’ Nest”. Merrill had never seen any crows at sea. Terns, gulls, fish eagles, but never a crow or a raven. Once a hummingbird had visited her up in the rigging, but only for a short while before zipping off toward Orlais.

She suspected that it had nothing to do with Antivan Crows, either. Even with their ability to hide in the depths of a shadow, this was too obvious a place for them to hide, let alone from which to deal death. Merrill knew there were Antivan pirates, but they were not associated with the Crows. Apparently there were pirates from almost every land. Not from the Anderfels, as they were landlocked. And as often as Isabela spoke of the idea of Dalish pirates taking over the sea with ferocious aravel-shaped ships, and forming partnerships with sea dragons instead of halla, Merrill could just not envision it.

She squinted down at the canvas sails puffed full of wind, trying to see Dalish patterns painted onto the bleached sailcloth. Would the lights on the stern and prow be traditional? Well, other than that they would have to use those sea lanterns that the other seamen used - they somehow kept the worst of the salt spray out. Merrill didn’t think an ordinary horn lantern would survive for long at sea. Would the sea salt change the color of the flame?

So many things to know. She’d never expected, as a Keeper’s First, to become close to another being the way she had come to know Hawke. 

Gareth Hawke, the big brash human who loved his friends with the whole heart. Merrill thought that her small pinched heart in offering was nothing compared to what he’d given her. If not for Hawke, the tiny Dalish woman would never have met Varric. Or Isabela. Or Bethany, who - although she was not Dalish, nor _elvhen_ \- had become a sister to Merrill.

Life was richer once she’d met Hawke. Once they’d become lovers, there was a joy added to the richness. The joy had become unbound after he’d freed her from obsession with the eluvian and rescued Marethari. Granted that had physically been Anders, Bethany, and Fenris, but most certainly none of that would have happened without Hawke bringing them all together and leading them. No, the man had given her a great treasure, one she was taking to a place of safety. Well, she thought as she watched the clouds fly by higher even than her perch above the _Siren’s Call_. More precisely, Hawke had created that treasure with her.

She had been uncertain after the Champion of Kirkwall had decided he was needed at the Ecclesiastical conference at Haven. He’d shipped her off for her own protection. That had irritated the _elvhen_ woman no end. Anders, taking her aside on the ride to the docks in Amaranthine, asked her, “Please watch over Bethany. And the children, Merrill. Beth doesn’t…” There was a moment when Anders, with a graveness that was quite foreign to his usually joking persona, had cleared his throat, swallowed, and taken a moment before finishing with, “Watch her back. She forgets. And watch your own back.” Then he repeated, “And I know I don’t need to tell you to watch the children.”

Merrill thought Anders had known. Anders had not spoken to his wife of it. Bethany did not know. Granted, Bethany’s talent at healing was not as strong as the blond human’s. She’d grow in skill, but did not have the innate talent of the spirit healer.

Luckily, the morning sickness was over. Merrill had passed off the last two days as sea sickness. Bethany had been dreadfully ill as well. The children had taken to sailing like halla to the woods. No problem for them.

“What will you be like?” the birdlike _elvhen_ wondered aloud. “Will you get sea sickness?

“Will you be tall like your father? A strapping big girl like Aveline - with your father’s spiky black hair? Or will you be slender and small with hair that falls in wisps, like me?

“If you’re small like me, will your talent run to knives like Isabela? Or elemental spells like Bethany? Or healing like Anders? Of course, Bethany and Gareth both speak of Carver, who used a giant two-handed sword like Fenris.” Carver was harder to imagine. Sometimes Merrill pictured a giant Fenris without the tattoos, and with black hair like Hawke.

“Of course you will probably be between our sizes,” she started to speak again, her words carried away by the wind. “Neither an heir of Arlathan and the Dales, nor a Fereldan.” And then, lest there be a misunderstanding, she added, “You’ll be what you’ll be. A joy to your father and me.”

Perhaps she should have sent a message with Anders. Hawke should know. She missed him so much already. Looking up into the blue sky above, she wished he were here to hold her in his arms, to whisper in his voice that did not know how to be quiet, and to see his joy upon finding out that he was, at long last, going to be a father.

Of course Merrill knew why she had not. A child. Gareth had wanted a son or daughter for so very long. One thing after another had happened, taking their attention, busying them with plans and importances for others. Never time for themselves. 

Merrill had been busy, always finding information in her correspondence with Phineas about the eluvians. Hawke had taken her to the Dragonbone Wastes, and they’d explored the immense bleached remains of massive creatures who had once ruled the land and air. Strange plants grew there, camouflaging the grinning skull bones large enough to make an aravel. Those were covered by the living carpet, and became hillocks and rocks.

Down in the cool moist underground of the caves, they discovered strange plants and deep mushrooms surrounding a small clear lake with a tiny island in the center. On the island was the eluvian, as Finn had promised. 

Hawke, irreverent as always, commented, “This is like an Orlesian melodrama, Merrill!”

At his lover’s quizzical look, Hawke grinned - white, strong teeth in that black, black beard. “A mysterious rendezvous in a grotto. A secret lake with a secluded island. I expect a chevalier to step out from behind a rock any moment and attempt to steal you away.”

To Finn’s disgust, Hawke had then proceeded to sweep Merrill off her feet, and the visit to see the eluvian became almost another of what Hawke called a “honeymoon”. Finn had blushed often, though they had tried to spare his sensibilities. 

_Really though_ , Merrill thought with discontent, _Finn’s research is quite picky._ She could find nothing that the scholar had not already thoroughly discovered and published. And that was part of the problem.

Surely a Dalish scholar would be better suited to study such important _elvhen_ artifacts? More in tune with Arlathan, with the magic of the ancient _Elvhenar_.

Finn claimed to have been to the ancient city of the elves. Hawke had suggested, in that strong manner of his, that Finn lead them there. That nearly endless trip to the Deep Roads had been entertaining, to say the least. Well, Hawke had been entertained. He’d kept track of the types of spiders they found and eliminated.

The remnant of artifacts that Finn and the Hero of Ferelden, Theron Mahariel, had found were all with another Dalish. How annoying that the clan member had not shared that information with any Dalish Keeper or First that Merrill had spoken with. How were her people ever going to reclaim their inheritance, their culture, if they refused to share?

Finn had carefully copied every scrap. Merrill politely accepted all that was offered, and began the task of passing that information along to every Keeper and First she met. This required much in the way of paper, ink, and patience; Merrill was not as good at copy work as many of her friends. Bethany assisted. It took time. So much time.

Their _elvhen_ heritage -“Tales of the Dales”, as Varric called it. It was important that the knowledge be disseminated. Gareth thought that this work, the Dalish life, was why Merrill had not given him children. That and a desire for purely _elvhen_ children.

Merrill, perched above the waves on Isabela’s sailing ship, shared a fond smile with the wind. Silly Hawke! Merrill wished for nothing more than to share parenting with Gareth Hawke, brash Champion of everyone and everything that needed him. It had just seemed that there was time enough later for the raising of children, for making a family. 

The smile faded. Now it might be too late. Events were moving, the world was changing and the situation was bad enough that Hawke had sent her out of the country. Anders had done the same with Bethany. Ferelden was not safe. Merrill could not imagine that Kirkwall would be any safer, what with its history of blood and terror. Of course it would be far safer than Orlais or Tevinter. Still, it would be good to see Aveline again. And Donnic. And to finally see the children. Letters did not convey more than glimpses of their life together. 

They would find a way to get word to Hawke about the baby. And Merrill knew that thought, his own child waiting for him, would draw him home to her more surely than any other beacon.


	3. Bethany, former apostate, former Circle mage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bethany's point of view.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Lunamoth116 for beta-reading!
> 
> Hooray for NaNoWriMo, which enabled me to finish this chapter!

A wooden ship, again. Attempting to sleep in the cramped cabin, Bethany Hawke remembered that first passage to the city of Kirkwall, over the Waking Sea. They had been crammed into the crowded hold then. It was hot, close, smothering, except when one attempted the deck, which was the opposite. The sea had been stormy; the smell and queasiness of her own seasickness, and that of everyone else, was brought home by the creak of planks moving together. The sound of the ship was so very different from a wooden cart on the land.

Ten years ago Bethany had taken ship with Gareth, Merrill, Anders, Isabela and the rest to escape from the chaos that was the devastation of Meredith Stannard’s destruction. Isabela’s _Siren’s Call 2_ was a smaller ship than the wooden coffin that had taken the family to Kirkwall; their grief over the loss of her twin Carver had been so new. This ship she was on right now was a good deal larger - a passenger vessel, and not a cargo ship.

It was not just the small size of Isabela’s boat that had made the trip different. They’d almost all been together then. Their family all together. Gareth, of course, and Anders, Merrill, Fenris, Varric. Not Aveline and Donnic. Nor Sebastian. Isabela had even made plans for the Grand Cleric Elthina, but she had refused to leave her flock.

A pang shot through Bethany at the loss of Sebastian and Elthina. Not that Bethany knew the Grand Cleric personally aside from attending Chantry services. Sebastian had loved her dearly, and Anders had respected the woman. There was a great loss to Thedas in her murder.

Not that Bethany was trivializing the loss of the Divine and all the other Chantry folk and magi dead in the catastrophe. But it was closer, more horrific when those lost were familiar.

Bethany, voluntarily immured in the Gallows teaching children and learning from Orsino, had been absent throughout much of Sebastian’s healing. Anders had not spoken much of that time at first. Bits and pieces came out in conversation over letters from Varric and Sebastian in the course of the eight years of her marriage to Anders. The topic had come up more frequently once news of the Conclave began to circulate. 

Poor Orsino. Doomed mage. Foolish man. Destroyed by his own hubris on the cusp of a new world.

There was a loud groan from the timbers surrounding them, jarring her thoughts back to the present. The brunette mage’s bedmate slung a leg over Bethany’s body, an arm pulling in tight around her waist. It was not completely uncomfortable, but it made her miss her husband all the more. Bethany and the children shared a miniscule cabin with Merrill. Bethany and Merrill shared the bottom bunk, the children the top. As Bethany had explained to Merrill, sharing a bed with the children was like trying to sleep in a writhing nest of dragonlings. 

The cabin was clean, and a steward took care of their needs. Meals were shared in the captain’s cabin and were edible, if heavy on fish. Jokes had been made at Fenris’s expense in his absence, of course. Bethany missed him and Isabela. The aches of missing and lost friends were heavy and continual. Just being on a ship reminded Bethany of those she had lost.

Gareth had insisted that they not wait for Isabela to show up. There was no way to get word to the Rivaini pirate, no way to find where the _Siren’s Call 2_ was berthed. 

Kirkwall, not a happy destination. Oh, Bethany was happy that they would see Aveline and Donnic. She wondered if Cullen had taken over the Gallows after Meredith Stannard’s spectacular self-destruction. Not that Cullen appealed to a grownup Bethany, married and a mother, and still in love with her husband after so many years of marriage. Her crush on the templar seemed to have been in another lifetime. A life that was now gone. She could grieve for that at least.

Bethany refused to grieve for Anders until she was sure he had lost his battle with whatever hell the Grey Wardens had put him through. There were still things about the Grey Wardens that Anders had not told Bethany about. She had not asked after his assertion that he was oath-bound to keep their secrets. Bethany thought his silence was more to protect her and the children from the horrific things he’d seen and done during his time with the Wardens. 

The children were a blessing. Bethany knew now that whatever made the Grey Wardens able to sense and fight the darkspawn prevented many of them from fathering children. Certainly female Wardens could not often conceive, and none of them could bring a child to term.

Bethany’s limited healing was not enough to puzzle out what the Wardens had done to the man who had become her husband. Anders, her husband. It was amazing to Bethany even now that she, a mage, had married. And to another mage. Every time she came close to losing her temper at their children - at the product of her and Anders’s love - she remembered the gift they were. Not taken away by the templars to be raised in the Chantry. Bethany had wondered what happened to those children. Mage blood was always suspect, but the child of two mages might as well be raised in a Tower. Bethany knew her children would be mages.

Chances were those children had ended up in a Circle somewhere. It was understandable if you tried to spread out the children of a conquered enemy. Of course, with the Chantry, those children were going to end up right back inside the Circle when they came into their magic. It was a system destined to destruct, and the time had come.

They’d been protected in Amaranthine, or so they thought. Theron had cast out the templars from the arling, and when Nathaniel had taken over he’d kept to that ruling. The destruction of the Conclave had been the final straw. And now she was on a ship heading for Kirkwall, one of the last safe places she knew.

But at least it was a place she knew. And Meredith Stannard was dead. That in itself was a huge point in favor of Kirkwall.

It was the thinking that was more awful than the seasickness.


	4. Thoughts of a Rivaini Queen of the Eastern Seas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Isabela's thoughts.

Isabela knew the Ben-Hassrath were searching for her still. The Qunari were like ants swarming their way toward a goal. Brute strength and sheer numbers - well, relatively so - would be put into pursuit, until someday the captain of the _Siren’s Call 2_ would slip and be captured, and after reeducation failed, would become some form of mindless worker in the Qunari fields. Failing that, Isabela knew there was the distinct probability she would end up as compost.

It was not just the fear of reeducation that panicked the pirate. The possible uses to which her body would be put after a successful integration frightened her more.

Isabela had escaped being a baby maker once. Believing that her husband’s abuse had eliminated that possibility when he had sent her tumbling down the steps of the original _Siren’s Call_ , killing the baby she’d been carrying for him at sixteen, the Queen of the Eastern Seas still exercised care in her liaisons to ensure that she would not get knocked up again. Pulling the Antivan brandy over to pour, the memory surged up and hit her between the eyes. 

A first mouthful of the raw distilled spirits that passed for recreational use on a Rivaini ship. Nothing like what she was swallowing now, of course. That wooden cup had been filled with a clear liquid, painful, breathing fire into her stomach.

Then it had been used for anesthetic purposes, to take away her senses, the sharp pain low down in her belly, the ache of the bruises on her face, the stab of anguish when she moved the arm they were trying to set.

No more child. It was gone. Not by her choice, not by her hand, but by his, for all that he had wanted the thing so desperately. So proper, she had been such a good girl, wearing nothing too revealing; the only jewelry was her necklace of whatever coins her husband had gifted to his property, the amount that would take care of her if he were to divorce her or cast her out or die before her. The greater portion, the bride price he had paid, was in the pockets of her mother, gone, lost to his hands in any case.

How had she provoked him, the Master of the _Siren’s Call_? Was it stepping from their tiny cabin to see the ocean, a sight that had held her from the first? Jealousy, perhaps, that others could see her face, for that was what he had hit first. He was an older man, forty years senior to her sixteen, but flirtation was not something that came easily to her, protected all her life, and so she never looked the sailors in the eye.

She had children enough now, didn’t she? Forty-seven offspring of her lover, broody Fenris. Mostly elven, though several were mixed-race. Isabella was certain their merry band had “rescued” every child mentioned in the slave registry of Tevinter as remaining alive. Varric called it “rescuing”. Isabela called the theft of slaves from the Imperium what it was - stealing. 

Or had it been stealing to return to Fenris what he’d never known was missing? What Isabela could never give him?

Now her lover was traveling. In Ferelden. Off to find out what had happened to the Choir Boy. He would return, she knew it. Of call of the people in her past, Fenris was the one who would return and be welcomed the most. Until that time, she would keep his children, their children, safe.


	5. Guard Captain of Kirkwall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aveline's viewpoint.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, Lunamoth116 for beta-reading!

Guard Captain Aveline du Lac Vallen Hendyr was facing the greatest challenge of her life. “But why? Why must I give up my room for strangers?” Piter Hendyr, in miniature a copy of his father Donnic, required a reason for everything. Bartemaus, his younger brother - but often mistaken for Piter’s twin - was standing behind his brother and waiting for her answer.

Parenting had not been all that different from her predictions of it. Aveline was not stupid. A practical person, she had known what she was getting into when she married Donnic and they had decided to have children. A flexible person - as all good managers must be - she had understood the necessity of shifting plans of battle to meet the circumstances. The Maker had seen fit to send her first the son who was most like Aveline - questioning authority, with a solid grasp of the logic of the law and a thirst to make all things right following that law.

Bartemaus, on the other hand - for all that he looked just like his older brother - was the image of his father in behavior. 

“These people are as close as family to me, Piter. We will not send them out to stay in an inn while we have room to spare here,” Aveline said steadily.

“Why can’t they stay just in Barty’s room? He can sleep with me.”

“You and Barty will sleep with your father and me. Bethany and Merrill will stay in your room because it is the smaller one. The children will sleep in Barty’s room. I thought you would prefer the privacy of our room, instead of sharing with Bethany’s brood. For now, this will be the arrangement, because we don’t know whether the plans will change.”

“Yes, Mother,” Barty said suddenly, tugging on his brother’s arm. Piter’s sharp look backward was followed by a surly “Yes, Mother” that spoke volumes about a return to that subject at a later date. They escaped the room.

Donnic laughed at her exasperation. He was still big, broad, and handsome, his cherished sideburns the only hair that was visibly graying. Aveline thanked the Maker for him daily.

“What?” she demanded, not quite as irritated as she presented.

“You. Attempting to reason with Piter and Bartemaus, when you are so longing to say ‘do your duty, guardsman!’” Her husband was laughing at her.

Aveline’s sigh was followed by, “If it were only that easy.”

Donnic smiled agreeably and took her into his arms for a kiss. 

Piter, though he didn’t know it, was echoing his mother. “What?”

Bartemaus was good at the quelling looks he’d inherited from both parents. Piter mostly ignored all of them. Barty said, “This is not a battle you are going to win, Piter. Make the best of it.”

“It’s not right. Why should we get kicked out of our beds for friends of Mother’s?” Piter tried for self-righteous, but managed only a whine.

“You’ve been out on the street,” his brother chided in his calm, quiet voice. “You know something is going on. Or rather, something is coming.”

“I know that the people of Kirkwall are sick of Fereldan refugees. Anyone with a connection to Ferelden is suspect.” Piter did know that. He’d fought enough fistfights when out and about.

“Exactly. Which means that Mother bends over backward to keep the peace. She must not appear to favor them. If she’s taking refugees into our home in spite of that, they must be important,” Barty said thoughtfully.

“Not important!” Piter’s impatient comment flowed close on the heels of Barty’s words. “If they were important, they’d be staying with the Viscount.”

“Important to Mother,” corrected Barty. 

“Hawke’s sister. The one who married Mad Anders. Their children, hers and Mad Anders. Mages. They’ll have to be.” There was silence while that was chewed over by the both of them.

“Traveling with Hawke’s Dalish woman,” added Barty.

“Merrill. Mother doesn’t like her,” commented Piter.

“Mother doesn’t dislike her. She just doesn’t trust any mages. Not after what happened to the Chantry,” Barty said.

Piter thought a moment, and then admitted, “Someone in the street told me that Mad Anders blew up the Chantry.”

Barty nodded. “I heard that, too. I asked Mother. And Father. They said that it was other mages. Blood mages. And that Anders isn’t a blood mage. She said that Brother Sebastian stopped the blood mages from hurting Grand Cleric Elthina. But he couldn’t save the Chantry building.”

“Father says that no one can save the Chantry. It’s gone downhill in his lifetime.” Piter scraped one foot across the back of the other. “Mother and Father sing the Chant to us. Do you think that Bethany the mage will know the Chant?”

“Will Merrill? She’s a mage, and she’s Dalish,” Barty said nervously.

“Will their children?” Piter offered.

Barty wondered, “How many children are coming? Do you know how old they are?” 

“Mother never says. She just uses a plural and avoids talking about them. I think she doesn’t know exactly how many Bethany has,” Piter sighed. Their mother was an excellent person, but she did miss out on some of the social niceties that the boys had picked up from their father.

“Then,” Barty snickered, “I suppose it’s our duty to take the children in hand. Make sure they’re not heathens and all.”

Piter looked at his brother strangely. “Why would it matter to us if they were heathens?”

“Oh, you’re not getting it, Piter. If we stay in pallets on the floor of Mother’s and Father’s room, we’ll be under their gaze for the entire time that the company is here. Which could be _years_.” Bartelamaus put a world of agony into that statement.

“Oh. _Oh!_ ” Piter gained understanding. “Yes. I certainly think we should make the company feel at home by sharing a room with them!”

Barty smiled. “Brilliant!”


	6. Bracing Bella

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Revisiting Bella.

Bracing. Wasn’t that the word the poets used for the brisk alternation of wind and ice cold sea water spraying over naked flesh? Not that she was completely naked, but barefooted and bare legged to match the short sleeves of her blouse. Bella loved sitting on the bowsprit. Really she did. There had been times - at the beginning - when it was the single place of privacy other than the tight quarters of her cabin down below. Not nearly so claustrophobic as the spaciousness of the Captain’s quarters.

Legs swinging on either side of the smooth wood of the bowsprit, Isabela thought about that. They said. Who were “they”? It wasn’t a saying in Rivain. Not that she liked remembering her birthplace, the family that had sold her to the loathsome man who had been her husband. Loathsome Luis.

Zev would always have her gratitude for releasing her from bondage to the vulgar Antivan pig. Zev might use the word bracing, but not for the ocean. Bella gave a low chuckle as she leaned forward, reveling in her balance along the ‘sprit.

Fenris might. Maker and the sea and the Siren, but she missed the elf. That particular elf. Gone off to find out what had happened to the choir boy. Bella assumed he was dead. Not Fenris, Sebastian. Brother Sebastian and his Elthina. Both gone, Bella was certain. Whatever had happened in Haven, and Isabela had heard plenty of rumours, Sebastian and Elthina were not the types to quietly disappear unless they had been victims of the slaughter. If they were still alive, Varric would have sent word, along with amusing descriptions of their travails.

Not that Bella had heard much from Varric. She was on the run, wasn’t she? Void take all of the Ben-Hassrath. And the Qunari. And the Qun.

Not that any of those, nor the Tevinter authorities, nor the Chantry had stopped her from accomplishing the greatest thefts of her career. Part of the reason why she was spending so very much time here on the bowsprit was that her hold, and her deck, the crows nest, and almost every part of her beloved Siren’s Call 2, was filled to the brim with elves. Elves that all looked suspiciously alike.

Maker bless Brand, for taking all of this in stride. Brand, also Elvhen - but not one of the elven treasures the Siren’s Call 2 was carrying - was her first mate, and had taken the invasion with good humour. Isabela wondered what Casavir would have made of the whole thing. She wasn’t sure where he was either. Hopefully serving under a good captain who would not drag him into her troubles.

Brand and the rest of her crew had taken on the shipboard training of the children. A snort of laughter was lost in the wind. When she’d come up with the idea of “rescuing” Fenris’s children, she’d been worried about taking care of infants and little kids. Hard to keep in mind that elves aged differently from humans. And that Danarius - may he be lost forever in the Void - had bred Fenris almost from the beginning after the magister had marked her lover up with the lyrium brands.

But no. Those “children” had been teens and adults by the time Isabela had tracked them down. Still slaves, of course. The Tevene were nothing if not practical about their belongings. Wealth was not given up if at all possible. The Imperium kept records of everything - and every person - they owned. Tax purposes.

Once the forty-seven of them still living had gotten over being kidnapped (stolen every one of them had said originally), not one of them had wanted to go back to Tevinter. Not all of them were suited for a life at sea. Those first few voyages had shown amusing variations of sea sickness and an inability for a couple of the “children” to get used to walking a deck in a heaving sea. They were down to seventeen now, which made for a very full ship added to the crew.

Children. Their “children”. Her step-children. For all that she would never marry again. She was Fenris’s sole partner. The kids. The only children she would ever have. Even though they were none of them infants anymore. And possibly had not been allowed to be babies when they were property of Tevene men and women across that empire. They’d all been trained in some professional skill. Farm workers, kitchen staff, pleasure slaves, and craftsmen.

Luckily Isabela had contacts. Mostly in Ferelden. Well, the ones she “trusted”. Which was good, as the Fereldan courts did not recognize the legality of slavery. Tevenes did not bring their slaves with them to Fereldan harbours, or across the country’s borders since Alistair and Anora had taken the crown. Isabela had set some of the kids up in farms or craft holds across Amaranthine and in Denerim. Not in the alienages, though. She wouldn’t do that to anyone.

The thing was that Danarius had been hoping for some sort of useful variants from Fenris’s offspring. Not even calling them children in his notes, they were chattel. The blood mage had thought the lyrium markings and the difference in Fenris’s blood would create faster, stronger slaves, possibly with mutations that could access the Fade easily. 

Some of the children had been used as sacrifices. All ages - babies, toddlers, young children, and adults. He compared their deaths to others in the manner of a researcher. The notes they’d found in Danarius’ possession at the time of his death had indicated that they’d not produced any greater result in casting spells. Apparently the madman was looking to find what race produced the best quality of blood for spell-casting and raising demons. 

Morbid. This line of remembrance was morbid. And Bella knew that it was time to practice with her knives, or swords, or splice some rope, or something other than lying here with her memories. A hands-on task. She missed Fenris. A good romp with him in the cabin would have helped if available. But Maker knew that she didn’t bed crew, and she wouldn’t have sex with Fenris’s children.

She could go and find him. Her elf. In the wilds of Ferelden. But the Ben-Hassreth were more and more active in Thedas, and unless Fenris was in desperate danger, she was not inclined to put herself in the way of those fanatics. It wasn’t just the qamek either. They’d happily take “the children”. After all of the trouble that they’d gone through to find and rescue them, Bella was not inclined to destroy their lives with another type of slavery.

“Isabela!” It was shouted, but in a bass voice that belied the shorter, mostly elvhen frame of the man calling to her.

“All right,” the pirate muttered to the wind. Rolling back, to pull long, bare legs up under, she stood, stretched, -still graceful after all these years, and did a back walkover, then a hop to the deck. “Primus,” she greeted the young man. Primus was not the boy’s birth name, nor the name that any of his owners had placed upon him. The name was one that he’d selected for himself soon after Isabela and his father had stolen him.

“Isabela,” he was always gravely courteous, “Brand wishes to speak to you.”

It was a very rude noise that Isabela used in response. Primus and all of the others had become used to that. When she followed him out of the wind, Primus gave a further explanation, “The barometer’s dropping.”

Isabela examined his unlined face. “I know. I felt it. Can’t you?” It was curiosity, not sarcasm.

A quick shake of the head, long, strands of dark hair moving like feathers on the air. “No. Is it something I will learn eventually?” His voice was even deeper than his father’s.

“Broken bones,” Isabela leaned forward, “ache when the weather changes. I know you’ve had some. Do you feel any change when a storm is brewing?”

Primus was slender in bone structure, in spite of his human mother. He ran a careful hand up his right arm, and then down again before saying slowly, ‘I didn’t know that was what it was. I just knew that I hurt sometimes.”

That elicited a nod. “Happens when you’re shoved down the stairs enough times.” Isabela tried not to lie to any of them. They, in return, honored her with more of their history than they’d shared with even their father.

“Corby is pleased with the fish I brought him this morning,” Primus usually diverted the conversation when it touched to close to painful memories.

That earned him a bright smile. “What type were they?” 

“Black tip. Excellent flavor. And the liver can be used for that fried dish you like so much,” was the shy reply.

“Mmmmmm,” Isabela hummed with delight. Primus had a skill with a skillet that made her tastebuds dance. But. “Perhaps not tonight, if we’re going to get a storm. You won’t have quite the audience for it from your siblings if they’re seasick. Corby will probably be battening down the galley if Brand is that worried about the barometer.”

That brought a cocked head and a thoughtful look. “I can salt the flesh to keep it, and make the flambeed livers for your luncheon.”

“What a wonderful idea, Primus!” Bella clapped the man on his back. “Now, I’d better be finding Brand.”

“He’s at the wheel,” Primus told her seriously.

“We should teach you to take the helm,” Bella threw over her shoulder as she headed aft.

“No! No, I’m happiest in the galley,” Fenris’ son told her. 

That little sentence made Bella very pleased. They’d started off with Primus never saying no, nor denying them anything. There was always going to be a way to go, but every one of the children had come so far. But now there was a storm to prepare for.

Later, the galley table, bolted to the deck, remained steady as the ship rocked to the beginning tempest. At the head of that table, surrounded by her new family and crew, the Captain of the Siren’s Call 2 grinned and winked at Primus standing at the stove. She enjoyed her finely prepared dinner of black tip livers flambeed with oranges and Antivan brandy, and while she missed her elf, Isabela was just as happy he wasn’t complaining about eating fish.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know about you all, but as annoying as Isabela can be at times, I think of what she's gone through and can give her a little slack on a lot of things.
> 
> Not everything, of course. But for all that she's selfish, she does take care of those she loves.


End file.
